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NGOs walk out from climate talks protesting at lack of ambition. Friends of the Earth / Luka Tomac www.lukatomac.comPhil
England: [The executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention
on Climate Change (UNFCCC)] Christina Figueres said in the
Guardian
that it would be politically very difficult to even talk about how
to fairly share the remaining safe emissions budget. She said: ‘I don’t know
who would hold the pen.’ But until we see a carbon budget embedded in the UN
talks, all our efforts to stay within two degrees will come to nought.

Mohamed Adow: If we continue at our current
emissions levels we will have used up the remaining carbon budget within about
25 years—which means, if we are serious about the two-degrees [Centigrade
ceiling on average global warming] objective, we need to engage with the
carbon-budget approach so that we are in line with what science says is
required. We’re in a situation now where the less well-off developing countries
are actually leading the world towards curbing climate change and the developed
world—Canada, Australia and Japan—are breaking their climate promises. These
countries are cowed by the dirty energy industries. They are setting the world
on a race to the bottom. We must stop them.

We need to be able to protect the planet for current and future
generations. We need to protect our food-production systems that are threatened
by climate change. We need to protect people in the Philippines and other
countries who are already feeling first and worst the impacts of climate
change. We need to shift the world from the dirty-energy pathway we are on to a
clean and sustainable pathway. If we are serious about climate change—and I
believe we are—it’s time we actually rose to the challenge. Let Typhoon Haiyan
be a wake-up call for the world to act in a way that is ambitious and also
fair.

PE: In sharing the effort, both to reduce
emissions and to fund developing countries to develop cleanly and adapt to
climate change, what principles are you using? My understanding is that the
principles are actually coming out of language that is in the original Framework Convention of
1992 that everyone is signed up to.

MA: That’s right. In 1992, countries
agreed to co-operatively prevent dangerous climate change, to be able to adapt
naturally to climate change and ensure food production is not threatened and
the world economy can progress in a sustainable manner. The core principles in
the convention [include] the adequacy principle. which
requires countries to undertake emissions reductions to avoid dangerous climate
change and to provide effective adaptation to the poorest and most vulnerable
countries.

The second important principle in the convention is the idea
of the right to sustainable development. This explicitly focuses on
safeguarding the sustainable-development rights of the poorest countries who
aspire to attain a decent standard of living. For those countries we are
required to help them move to low-carbon development through finance and clean
technology provided by those countries with the most historical responsibility and
greater [financial] capacity.

PE: Using these principles you’ve been able
to quantify the amount of effort each country should make. How do your results
differ from what’s currently on the table?

MA: Countries have acknowledged that
there is an ambition gap. They’ve proposed to close this through action to face
down gases that are polluting the atmosphere, to shift subsidies from dirty
energy to clean energy and to undertake international co-operative actions
around renewable energy and energy efficiency. They need to follow through and
deliver on these commitments. Warsaw must agree a clear timeline on increasing
the ambition of countries in the pre-2020 period. And the kind of commitments
we are looking for is what the science says we need to stay below two degrees
[warming]. What is required is for emissions to peak around 2015 and for
countries to publicly state that they will be raising their ambition levels and
contributing to the global climate fund, with adequate financing to support
those countries that are affected by climate change, and to support
particularly the poorest countries to develop in a clean manner.

PE: So what kind of obligation does the US,
for example, have under this framework?

MA: The US has about 4.5 per cent of
the global population. If you look at climate emissions from just 1990 they are
responsible for 27 per cent of the global emissions. If you look at US capacity—that
is national income adjusted for purchasing power
parity—the US has about a third of the world total, which means the US has
to take on about a third of the global responsibility. The current industrialised
countries, where about 17-18 per cent of the global population live, will be
required to take on nearly two thirds of the emissions cuts. And these are the
same countries who have nearly 60 per cent of global income, once you’ve
adjusted for and excluded the proportion of the population that lives under the
development threshold. So if you adjust income for basic need you realise the
global capacity sits with the rich industrialised countries and it’s these
countries that have to pay for a lot of the actions that will be required by
developing countries.

PE: But we have a huge gap in terms of
ambition right now.

MA: This is a gap that has been with
us since Copenhagen when countries put forward their initial mitigation [of emissions]
and climate-finance commitments. There is a difference between the emissions
the world is on course to produce and the ambition level required to [get] on
track for the two-degree emission pathway. If we look at finance,
the world committed to raising $100 billion by 2020. There was a commitment to
deliver ‘fast track finance’ of
$10 billion per year between 2009 and 2012 but for the period between 2013 and 2020 there is
currently no collective commitment on climate finance. Parties have
acknowledged these gaps and they’ve indicated they will be closing them. But we
need to be seeing concrete action—otherwise we will be shooting beyond the
agreed global climate objective of [staying below] 2C.

PE: Besides being embedded in the UN
Framework Convention on Climate Change, to which everybody is already signed
up, what other support is there for this approach currently?

MA: Civil society supports our equity
principles, our equity indicators and the framework we have put forward.
Governments have also started talking about equity in ways that are linked to
the convention principles. They’ve acknowledged these principles and have
committed not to reinterpret them. Governments like South Africa and the
African group that includes 54 countries and the Least Developed Countries are
supportive. We are pleased to note that the volume on equity has been turned up
this year. But what we need is to establish a clear vision that captures the
UNFCCC principles in a way that they can be operationalised.

We’re looking forward to forging a clear plan that is based on
the principles of the convention. But we are far away from where we ought to
be. Warsaw has to bridge the gap between developed and developing countries
[and] between the different government views and increase understanding on the
need for effort sharing. That is what is required to be able to deliver an
effective deal in Paris in 2015.

PE: Even though we’re expecting a deal to
be agreed in Paris in 2015, it’s not going to come into effect until 2020. Is
there any reason why it has to take five years before it comes into effect or
is there any way of moving that timetable forward?

MA: In effect governments are delaying
the desperately needed climate action. But governments also agreed to ramp up
their pre-2020 ambition, because 2020 is going to be too late for poor people
who are on the front line. What is needed is urgent, ambitious action in the
pre-2020 period. So they must agree—between now and in Paris in 2015—on
concrete steps for the pre-2020 period to curb the rise in the world’s
emissions and to be able to deliver the climate support that is required both
to adapt and cope with a changing climate, and to shift towards a clean-development
pathway.

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